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Friday, April 05, 2013

The "pro-life" side of the abortion argument always claims the moral upper hand. Mostly Christian, they cite their religion as the sole measure of their moral and ethical beliefs and wave the Bible around as proof of their righteousness. But, as is so often the case with fanatics, they don't actually follow their religion, so much as twist it and pervert it in order to force it to follow them. Their moral upper hand never stays up for long before it comes to slap the crap out of benighted unbeliever. These people are Bible-thumpers, sure. But when they thump that Bible of theirs, it's generally over someone's head.

The life of a Latina assemblywoman in Nevada has been threatened after she used a story about her own personal abortion experience at age 16 to make a point about the importance of sex education.

“I’m going to say something I’ve never said publicly before, because — Why not? I’ve been open about everything else?” Democratic Assemblywoman Lucy Flores reportedly told the state Assembly Education Committee on Monday. “I had six other sisters, all of them became pregnant in their teens — all of them. One was 14 years old when she got pregnant with twins. That is what I had to learn from.”

“I had an abortion because I didn’t have access to birth control, or even an understanding of what that meant,” she explained. “I didn’t even understand that my worth did not come from men, or sex with men, trying to fill up a hole in me from so much pain.”

So yeah. Followers of the "Prince of Peace." If these people are so pro-life, then why doesn't the fact that Flores is getting death threats surprise anyone?

Flores was testifying as to the stunning (and entirely predictable) failure of her state's abstinence-only education policy. Her personal story is a story that's been repeated over and over in Nevada and other states, where the educational system has failed kids by leaving them almost entirely ignorant about reproductive health. She wants to reduce teen pregnancy -- and with it, rates of abortion -- through honest education and access to birth control. For the most part, she's actually on the pro-lifer's side. They merely disagree about the method.

And for that, the heretic must die.

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It's the movement itself that tries to stoke up this level over anger over things like this. Shameless spin went immediately into gear, with "conservative websites like Life News [getting] the message out to anti-abortion activists with headlines like: 'Democratic Legislator: I Don’t Regret Killing My Baby in Abortion.'"

Of course, that's not what she said at all, but the morally superior anti-choicers have never had any qualms about lying. In fact, that's not the only lie Life News would tell about the incident.

“Unlike Flores, most women regret their abortions and tell painful stories of how they are often unable to come to grips with taking the life of their child,” Life News’ Steven Ertelt wrote.

This is an old lie of the anti-choice movement. The fact is that women abort because they feel it's necessary (proven by the fact that when abortion is illegal, women die) -- in fact, it's hard to think of another reason why someone would have an elective abortion. People tend not to regret doing necessary things. In fact, most women report feeling relieved. But the truth doesn't serve the cause, so the truth is of no use to them.